xv, 166 pages : 25 cm

"In the heart of Washington, D.C., a centuries-old landscape has come alive in the twenty-first century through a re-creation of the natural environment as the region's original peoples might have known it. Unlike most landscapes that surround other museums on the National Mall, the natural environment around the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) is itself a living exhibit, carefully created to reflect indigenous ways of thinking about the land and its uses. The Land Has Memory offers a rich introduction to the NMAI landscape and its meanings." "The museum features four distinct habitats that recall the indigenous landscape of the Chesapeake Bay region before European contact: hardwood forest, wetlands, meadow, and traditional croplands. Abundantly illustrated with photographs and drawings, this volume offers beautiful images of the museum's natural environment in every season as well as the uniquely designed building itself. Essays by Smithsonian staff and others involved in the museum's creation provide an examination of indigenous peoples' long and varied relationship to the land in the Americas, an account of the museum designers' efforts to reflect traditional knowledge in the creation of individual landscape elements, detailed descriptions of the plants used in the context of each of the four landscape environments, and an exploration of how the landscape changes seasonally. The Land Has Memory serves not only as an attractive and informative keepsake for museum visitors, but also as a thoughtful representation of how traditional indigenous ways of knowing can be put into practice."--BOOK JACKET

"Published in association with the National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution."

Includes bibliographical references (p. [151]-152) and index

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